John Keats' “Ode to a Nightingale,” basically arouses all the human senses: namely hearing, taste, smell, touch, and sight with his extensive use of imagery that he describes throughout the poem to give emphasis to the emotions that he feels. Based on his certain descriptions of places, objects, and feelings, Keats makes uses of words that would combine multiple senses in a single imagery, which is a process called synesthesia.
The process basically uses images that would stimulate two or more senses which would combine as if they were functioning as one. One example of this process can be found in a line in the first stanza's line, “In some melodious plot Of Beechen Green. ” Although at first glance, the line appears to be very vague, Keats actually combines the sense of hearing in his use of the word “melodious” and the sense of sight in the words “beechen green” to produce a single image.Moreover, another example can be found in the second stanza, particularly the three lines, “Tasting of Flora and the country green, Dance and Provencal song, and sunburnt mirth! O for a beaker of the Warm South! ” In these three lines, the poet evokes the sense of taste in “Tasting of Flora and country green,” the sense of hearing in “Provencal Song,” and the sense of touch in “sunburnt mirth. ”Although almost stanza of the poem contains images that combines multiple senses, there are also certain lines that evokes only a single sense.
In the first stanza's line, “My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk” the poet describes his emotions after he drank the wine which means it arouses the sense of taste. In addition, the sense of sight is also evoked in the line of the second stanza, “With beaded bubbles winking at the brim” wherein the poet sees the sparkling bubbles of the wine he has drunk.
